I’ve reached Day 84 of my 100 days of mixed media, also known as my “Reconstructed Self” series! Here’s how it’s going.

I made one of my favorite pieces on Day 69 ….

… and then I had a bit of a slump and then a plateau about three-quarters through.

I’ll be honest. I think I was getting bored and it was getting hard to come up with new ideas, so I got a little blocked So, to get the flow going again, I took some of the elements I was using every day and started pushing their forms a little.

I’ve acquired so many favorite gestures, some of these pieces teeter on the verge of disaster with too much going on, so my challenge every day is to bring all of it into harmony.

My new goal is to pull back more and seek a balance between poetry and complexity.

When I was a child, I took piano lessons for a few years. I remember learning the right hand, then the left hand, then putting them together and then adding more notes to each hand and gradually playing more and more complex pieces. Later, playing the French horn in my school band, I came to appreciate how all the instruments are layered over one another to create a complicated piece of music.

Making abstract paintings follows a similar process, at least for me. You have to learn the notes and movements first and then gradually bring everything together.

Fortunately, I’m more gifted visually than I ever was musically!

Follow me on Instagram to see this series continue to unfold! Original pieces are available in my Etsy shop.